MT is being increasingly used as a productivity enhancer for translators. Lingo 9 gives users access to three publicly available MT sources: Google, Bing and MyMemory. These are public versions, so users must be aware that their content is being streamed over the internet, and thus security may be an issue. But for rapid translation and post-editing (review of the machine-translated content by a human translator), many users and companies will find Lingo a good option for kick-starting translation work. One added feature of the built-in MT functionality is the ability to do concordance searches on MT results. This is a nice feature to have to quickly check the accuracy of translations across contexts in your content....

Plunet BusinessManager is a web-based tool that runs on a Tomcat web server with MySQL database, though it has also been implemented with MS-SQL. The tool is laid out in a very logical way, analogous to the natural flow of a project. The next tab over on most every screen is the natural next step in a project’s workflow, which allows users to feel at home very quickly. The Home screen features a customizable dashboard that helps to keep project managers organized and on task. Most everything is immediately apparent from the dashboard and the details are a mere one-to-two clicks away. Via the main menu bar, the tool gives access to contacts, requests, quotes, orders and invoices, which are the primary functions used by project managers....

Upon first launch, the user is greeted by a welcome screen containing links to the most important work areas within the software, either from the ribbon or from a navigation panel on the left-hand side. The top of the navigation panel contains an area that displays applications from OpenExchange. The prominent positioning of this display is a not-so-subtle hint at the importance SDL has placed upon OpenExchange as an extension of the core product functionality. Four applications are listed by default, followed by a link to the OpenExchange website.

Although OpenExchange has been available to licenced Trados Studio users since the 2009 version (Service Pack 3), providing users access to a variety of helpful utilities that could run alongside Trados, the 2014 release has made use of a new Integration application programming interface (API) that allows developers to embed their applications directly into the Trados user interface. OpenExchange applications thereby become part of the overall user experience, extending the core product functionality with a palette feature set that is essentially limited only by the time, resources and interest of third-party developers....

Early on, the folks in charge at MadCap recognized that there was a strong link between the language and technical writing industries (this may have a “duh” effect on most of us, but remember that many in the technical authoring world have yet to make this amazing discovery). So they spent quite a bit of early effort to become more visible to the translation industry, partly by showing up at industry events but also by providing useful features such as full Unicode support, outstanding double-byte support for East Asian languages and support for bidirectional languages. . .

translate5 can be expected to gain more prominence on the tools landscape in the coming years, as it has been chosen as the front-end user interaction medium for QTLaunchpad, an initiative funded by the European Commission that seeks to improve translation quality throughout Europe. Because the application is open-source, organizations can tailor it specifically to their own needs as opposed to remaining beholden to a tool manufacturer’s vision of what such a tool should offer. . .

The system requirements for a user to run XTM are quite moderate because all resource-intensive processing is done on the XTM Cloud server. You can use an average business computer and there is no need to upgrade your hardware in the future in order to support XTM. The system is based on open standards such as XLIFF, SRX, TMX and TBX and a complete implementation of the reference model as specified in open architecture for XML authoring and localization. The main advantage is that this ensures data interchange with other compliant systems. . .The full review is publicly available.

Many of the most popular translation tools available in the market have now implemented web-based solutions, but these solutions are often feature-limited alternatives to their more complete desktop applications. Wordbee’s browser-based only philosophy releases the user from the burden of having to install a desktop version, but without losing any of the tool’s functionalities. Wordbee is a totally customizable collaborative translation management system (TMS), which makes it an eligible solution for both corporate and governmental institutions as well as for language service providers (LSPs). Thanks to its automated workflow technology, Wordbee makes the translation process smoother and simpler at all levels, yet efficient and successful, even for enterprises working with mixed internal and freelance teams or only with external translation professionals. . .

Not quite two years old, MemSource Cloud is already developing into a complete and user-friendly online translation environment. The developers were originally attached to a Charles University research project that resulted in a server and code editor plug-ins destined to solve the problem of inconsistency when translating text strings. Based in Prague, MemSource is proving to be a useful resource for project managers and linguists alike. . .

Lingoport Resource Manager version 1.0, which was released early in November, is a software solution that monitors the software build environment for localization-relevant changes, flags and extracts changed resource files on behalf of localization project managers, automates the testing of both outbound and inbound localized resource files, and automatically replaces build-ready files back into the build environment in the proper location. . .

CATALYST 10’s second major project preparation improvement is the new Terminology Harvest Expert, which generates terminology databases in the open standard TBX or CSV format by analyzing CATALYST projects using a combination of statistical methods, content examination and optional manual override thus identifying term candidates. “Minor” innovations are the new Project Division Expert, which streamlines and foolproofs distributed localization effort and a new connector to the GlobalLink Term Manager. . .

While the software was still in its beta phase and again since its release, I tested its track changes features, terminology extraction, file-based pre-translation, file imports and more. Although most of these features are useful for project managers and translators alike . . .

I recently had the opportunity to discuss the product vision with technical director Dominik Radziszowski. I want to focus on the current product version, but I think it is important to see this version as movement along an arc with a definite goal in mind. Radziszowski recognizes the amazing diversity among LSPs, and rather than trying to be “all things to all people,” he has set a course that allows XTRF to focus on core capabilities. . .

In 2009, SDL Trados Studio integrated the formerly independent translation memory (TM) products SDLX and Trados into one consistent graphical user interface. The only remnants of the two merged products are different user profiles that use keyboard shortcuts and pre-translation and translation settings similar to Trados or SDLX, respectively. In addition to these concessions to old Trados and SDLX users, the default user profile ...

I have to confess that MultiTrans has not been on my radar for quite some time and everything seemed to be rather quiet on that front — but then many of MultiCorpora’s customers are large-scale, semi-secret and public-sector institutions with internal translation departments such as government and United Nations agencies. This changed, though, with the ...

In his review of the Plunet BusinessManager in the April/May 2010 issue of MultiLingual, Richard Sikes mentioned the possibilities that exist for several CAT tool integrations such as SDL Trados TM Server, Across Language Server and MultiTrans from MultiCorpora. One of the most recent integration additions is ...

Fluency is most aptly named. I've been watching the development of translation environment tools, often called somewhat more narrowly computer-aided translation tools, for a number of years now, and I think it's not an exaggeration to say that this very young tool is developing at a faster pace than any other tool I've looked at in the past. Only a few weeks ago I wrote about Fluency elsewhere, and already much of what I wrote is obsolete — partly because ...

From the very beginning, memoQ has been a tool envisioned by translator-developers for translators, with a side order of server functionality. As the developers of memoQ themselves translate and therefore know what translators need in their daily work ...

When we think of software solutions that have been designed for language service providers (LSPs), we tend to think first about translation memory (TM), and there can be no dispute that TM creation, persistence and usage are central to cost-effective translation ...

Over the past few years we have been witnessing the rapid evolution of translation productivity tools  the term translation memory (TM) being now somewhat insufficient to describe where the technology is heading. There is a move ...

There is no doubt that Across has put a lot of brainpower into architecting its flagship Language Server product line, and, concurrent with the newly released v5, the company employed "Enterprise Language Intelligence" as their launch headline ...

Noel Coward was reputed to have said that "work is more fun than fun"  understandable if, like Noel, you can get paid for pursuing your passion. However, the thing about passions is that people mostly don't get paid for them ...

To provide the most comprehensive coverage of SDL Trados Studio 2009, this review has been coauthored by Richard Sikes and Angelika Zerfaß. Angelika is well known in the translation industry as an SDL Trados guru, trainer ...

An old adage holds that beauty is only skin deep, but SDL Passolo 2009 proves to be the exception to that wisdom. While there has never been any doubt that Passolo is, and has always been, a localization tool of enormous agility ...

When Yves Champollion developed Wordfast in 1999, only a few translation memory (TM) software products were available, most of them at prices out of reach for freelance translators with a tight budget. Therefore, Wordfast's first objective was ...

ToolBook is a widely used e-learning authoring tool made by SumTotal Systems. In fact, ToolBook won the 2007 Platinum Award from the eLearning Guild as the software learning system most used by large corporations ...